Mark had the rings, each in a little morocco case, carefully laid away in the inside pocket of his coat.
When they reached Canal Street, to Mark's surprise, his cousin Edgar entered the car. He did not recognize Mark at first, the latter no longer wearing the messenger's uniform.
"How do you do, Cousin Edgar?" said Mark.
"Oh, it's you, is it?" he said. "Please don't call me cousin."
"I am just as much ashamed of the relationship as you are," responded Mark with a comical smile.
"That is impertinent. Besides it isn't true. Have you been discharged from the telegraph service?"
"Because you are not wearing the uniform."
"I am working for a party that doesn't want me to wear it while in his service."
"Oh, just as you like. Isn't that a new suit?"
"Business seems to be pretty good with you. How much did it cost?"
"I didn't know but you might have bought it in installments."
"Yet you pretended a little while since that you and your mother had hard work to get along."
Edgar got out at Twenty-Third Street. Mark kept on till he reached Forty-Seventh Street. He walked toward Seventh Avenue, and finally stood in front of the house in which the customer for the diamond rings was staying. It was a plain three-story residence with nothing peculiar about it. Mark rang the bell, little suspecting what was in store for him.
A boy of about seventeen, shabbily dressed, answered the bell.
"Is Mrs. Montgomery at home?" asked Mark, referring to a card.
The boy left Mark standing in the doorway, and went up-stairs.
Mark followed him up the staircase and into a back room. It was scantily furnished. There was a lounge on one side of the room, and a cabinet bed on the other. These, with three chairs and a bureau, constituted the furniture.
"Just step in here," said the boy, "and I'll call Mrs. Montgomery."
Mark took a seat on the sofa and awaited the arrival of the lady.
He did not have long to wait. The door opened, but the lady he expected did not appear. Instead, a young man entered whom Mark instantly recognized as the person who had left the Fifth Avenue stage under suspicious circumstances on the day when the old lady was robbed of her pocketbook.
Mark started and wondered if the recognition was mutual. It did not appear to be.